The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - Aaron Reiss: Watson Isn't Being Put In A Position To Succeed

Episode Date: October 2, 2020

Aaron Reiss: Watson Isn't Being Put In A Position To Succeed

The Matt Thomas show continues on Sports Talk 790, where Rockets and Astros play. And real Texans talk. 119 on the Matt Thomas show. Hey, we've got our buddy Aaron Rieson, who's like Matt, I must speak to you on Tuesday. And I'm like, Aaron, you can't. The Astros are on. So he called me at the house. We talked Texans for 10 minutes.

Now he's kidding. Aaron's a good friend of the show. Aaron J. Reese on Twitter. You can find them from the athletic. All right, Aaron. So walk me through, in your mind, the rumor mill. How close did the Vikings-Texans game get to being potentially postponed? You know, I don't think it got very close. I think it was kind of day-to-day, so it's hard to say, like, one development from one

day to the next or kind of how the Evesant flows with it. But, I mean, so long as there were no positives on the Vikings end, they were good to go. But I certainly, I would say this from like an outside of preserver standpoint, keeping up with the news out of Minnesota and talking to our Vikings supporter at the athletic chat graph. I had doubt that it was going to actually have it on Sunday, just given that, you know, some of these got one of the guys who's positive.

I think on the Titans played like 51% of the snaps. And, you know, there's another player now is positive on the Vikings I saw today. And so I don't know who that was or only snaps he's played. But you just, you think about kind of how often these guys are on the field. Obviously, it's a good thing that, you know, It seems that no Vikings were infected, but it's scary stuff. And I thought I was kind of thinking there was a chance where the game would have it later or get pushed back. Well, it's going on 12 noon Sunday Inside Energy Stadium.

Are you surprised that there are tickets available for the game? I mean, nothing journalistic to it, but just as an opinion about that we're finally going to get fans in the stadium. And there may be some empty seats available among the, I guess, the 12,000 or so that are available to the audience. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, like, I don't blame anyone, obviously, for not wanting to go. Both a public health standpoint and a just like how you're spending your money standpoint, right? I mean, the economy has come back a little bit, but I know unemployment's still pretty high, and people don't feel like spending money on a game for two, oh and three teams,

and an environment that's going to be a little lackluster because of a limited amount of people and all that sort of stuff. I'm not too surprised. I think kind of the fan base here is at a point, especially the Texans, it seems like being kind of a little resigned, a little over it. I don't know if like the first thing you're looking, first sporting right, you're looking to go to during a pandemic is the 0-and-3 Texans against the 0-and-3 Vikings. Yeah, I think it's threefold.

I think it's disposable income has been cut back. I think games on television continue to be the easiest way to watch NFL, and again, zero wins between the two teams. So you were talking to your Minnesota Vikings guy, And I used to live up there, so I know a lot of friends up there as well. How in the world do the Vikings lose to the Titans when they had two different players over 150 yards individually in offense? That just doesn't seem possible, does it? But it happened.

No, it doesn't. You know, I mean, I think, you know, it seems like kind of with this Vikings team, you know, obviously the defense has been the identity under Mike Zimmer. But, you know, they kind of were doing this like a rebelled on. the fly while remaining competitive type of deal or that's what they wanted to be doing. And, you know, it seems like kind of they've come to admit that the defense is just not kind of where it needs to be in order to do that, given the kind of the sacrifices they've made on offense in terms of trading away Stefan Dix and, you know, kind of having a weak interior

offensive line. And, you know, I think when a situation is not great and that can mean a lot of things, whether it's, you know, things not working on offense or the defense kind of putting him in a position being behind where play action is not so he can lean on. Kirk Cousins is not great. And so I think kind of all those things are just stacked on top of each other for Minnesota. And that's why they're going to break. Aaron Reese of the Athletic here on a sports talk 790. Aaron, I found myself watching the Ravens and Chiefs game on Monday night

and watching their offenses and how different they are and the motion and all the misdirection, all that types. I mean, I just felt like it was light years ahead of what Bill O'Brien does. Did you ever, I mean, did you watch that game? Did you get that feeling? And just your overall thoughts of what Bill O'Brien needs to do better offensively for this team, because they've struggled obviously so far? Yeah. You know, I think obviously watching that game and then, of course, watching the Texans lose to each of those teams during the first two weeks. You know, kind of the takeaway I had is, it's like you watch those guys and I think it's impossible to not think, look at

these teams doing everything possible to kind of put their young quarterbacks in a position to succeed, right? And Deshaun Watson maybe exists half a tier below those guys are kind of in the same tier, but the last guy you mentioned in that group. And I think a lot of that is just kind of the, he's not being put in that same sort of position.

You know, this offense is just like, I wrote them today. They've reduced play action at the fourth lowest rate in the league. And because of just a number of plays they've had, they've attempted the least play action passes in the league. And, you know, like, all the stats indicate that that, like, using play action is good, and you really

can't use it enough, and you don't really need to be actually having, establishing the runner, all that sort of old school mantra in order to do it successfully. If you're going to, you know, run it 13 times with David Johnson on first and second down, maybe one of those times you pull the ball back and take a shot. You know, they have an incredibly accurate quarterback downfield. They have a bunch of speed. So that seems like something they should probably be doing more up. Along those lines, too, you know, like they should probably be using a few more screen passes,

which is something that happens have not done for a while now. And, you know, like, he's getting hit all the time. they've put all these resources into their office line. I don't think it's necessarily so much because the talent on the line is regressed. I think it's because this team clearly just does not have answers when they're blitzed and in terms of like throwing the hot receiver and stuff like that. So it's just all around. Like I don't think he's being put in a position to succeed.

And he's still talented enough that at times he's going to break through that. And I think you saw that and some of those scoring drivers against Pittsburgh. But as it stands now, they're just playing at kind of too volatile level, I think, to win consistently. This is a ridiculous question, okay? So I'm just going to just get it out of the way. And nice short answer. Is Tim Kelly in any trouble in play calling? I'm in terms of like, you know, maybe I just gave him the range too soon.

Yeah, you know, I haven't heard that. But I have wondered. I mean, I don't think we're going to, I don't think it will be like next week or anything. But I think at some point, you got to wonder like if they're basically running the Bill of Ryan playbook, right? I mean, I don't like anyone would say that they're seeing a lot of new wrinkles with Tim Kelly, which is not that surprising you think about this guy's been a GA with a, O'Brien, so you know, O'Brien is at Penn State, like, kind of everything he knows in terms of philosophy is from O'Brien.

So if you're going to run the O'Brien playbook, I think at some point, Bill O'Brien might say, I could do it better than you, right? That's kind of, I think that's the question. But I think it's a little too early because, you know, at the end of the day, they've played two elite defenses in the Ravens and the Steelers. And I think even the Chief's defense is better this year than it has been in pastures 13th and DBOA through your games. So, you know, those are three pretty good defenses.

I don't think it's time just yet to sound the alarm bells. You know, the Texans have enough talent on offense that they might ultimately disappoint and be this volatile team, like I'm saying, but I think there will be highs that stay in themselves for a full game, and they could, you know, kind of blow some teams out to put a bunch of points at some weeks, and that might pull some wool over the second's eyes and make them feel like things are, you know, going to the right direction with their offer. Aaron, it feels like the JJ Watt is getting crankier by the week. is that because he's disappointed

with his overall team play, his individual play, or the vibe around the organization right now? You know, I mean, I don't think there's anything for him to be disappointed about in terms of his individual play. I wondered, coming into the season,

because he's, what, 31 now, you know, like, he'd been pretty good when healthy last year. I think he was leading a league in pressures when he was, when he went out last year with that, that peck injury.

But I wondered, you know, if he was going to fall off a little bit, just because, you know, it's football that can happen. time with these guys. But that doesn't seem to be the case with him. He still playing really, really well.

He just seems disappointed in, at least what he said, is he's disappointed in kind of the defense on their side, especially kind of the way they've faltered late and just been batting them the run late and just don't kind of seem up, kind of fold when opponents are trying to put them away. So that's what he seems, he seems fresh. I would agree with you there. Yeah, I mean, I think every week, the zooms are a little bit shorter. The answers are a little more curt. and if not for the fact that he was playing his brothers last week. I don't know how great his midweek pre-game Zoom would have been either.

All right, we're going to make our predictions on our show here in a second, but since we're going to let you go in a minute, time for you to tell us, do the Texans beat the Vikings on Sunday? No, I made the same prediction that in our preview with our Vikings writer, Chad Graff that you can read on the athletic. I'm picking the Vikings to win 28 to 24. I just think the Texans don't have the run defense to stop Dalwin Cook. See, I'm going to go glass half full and say, well, nor do the Titans defense, but they still won, right?

Yeah, that's true. That's true. But I think the Titans may be a little more offensive consistency than the Texas. Damn, I hate when you bring logic. All right, Aaron. Have a great weekend. And we're going to get back to our normal spot, I think on Tuesday, depending on the Astros. So whatever the case may be, we look forward to reading your work.

Everybody, please go subscribe to Aaron does a fantastic job. with The Athletic, it's very affordable. It's the best sports journalism you can possibly spend at Aaron J.Ries on Twitter. And we'll have a great weekend. We'll look forward to reading your stuff over the weekend. Yeah, thanks. Bye. All right.

We'll see you later. That's Aaron Reese from The Athletic.